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The wonderful thing about Tiggers (Tiggers are wonderful things) are numerable. They range from Tiggers' tops being made out of rubber to their bottoms being made out of springs, from their being bouncy, trouncy, flouncy, pouncy to their being fun, fun, fun, fun, fun. Perhaps however, the most wonderful thing about Tiggers is that Tigger is the only one. Rabbit is certainly most pleased that Tigger is the only one (imagine what Rabbit would do if he had to deal with more than one Tigger), but as we learn in The Tigger Movie, Tigger is not always happy being the only one. There are times when Tigger most definitely desires a whole Tigger-ific family.
Much of the film finds Tigger lamenting his lack of Tigger relatives and the rest of the gang from the Hundred Acre Wood, led by Roo, doing their best to make Tigger happy again. They proceed in typical fashion for the animals from the Wood and end up solely making things worse before everything eventually works itself out again by the end.
The overall construction of The Tigger Movie is very reminiscent – purposefully, no doubt – of the original The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. The film starts out live action in a boy's room with a very similar voiceover by an omniscient narrator. Additionally, the film does occasionally break the fourth wall, and from time-to-time flips pages in the book the audience is supposedly being read to from.
Similarly, several moments in the plot itself play off of moments from Poohs past – Rabbit gets angry at Tigger for his bouncing ways, homes are destroyed, and Pooh goes up a tree to find honey to name a few. Nothing plays out exactly as it has done before, but there are several moment s in the film when one will get the sense of déjà vu.
While at times this homage to the original Pooh feature seems a little crude and as though the writers (story by Eddie Guzelian and screenplay by Jun Falkenstein who also directed) here couldn't come up with more for the characters to do, more often than not it actually provides for a pleasant stroll down memory lane. One gets the feeling watching the film that the reason some of the scenes are eerily similar to what happened in the first feature is that life in the Hundred Acre Wood plays out in much the same way day after day, and what with Pooh being a bear of very little brain and all that makes sense.
The songs in the film are fun and will certainly entrance the younger set. On this 10th anniversary set, two of them are repeated in the bonus features, one as a Kenny Loggins music video and the other as a sing along. Other special features include several games and a DVD-based storybook, but the highlights in that arena go to two Tigger-based episodes of the Saturday morning cartoon The New Adventures of Winnie The Pooh. And, for added portability, a digital copy of the film is part of the release as well.
The Tigger Movie is more than just a cash-in sequel on a classic Disney movie, it is wonderfully fun all on its own and delivers (without too much heavy-handedness) morals about the importance of friends and family and everyone's desire to find loved ones. What more could one want from a trip to the Wood?
